Sunday, May 30, 2010

Dash for the Churn Dashes!

Yep...I've got some fun sew times coming up in the future, and I really do better when I have to travel with my sewing stuff if I just take time to do the pre-cutting as much as I can before I go!

In celebration of my being home for (almost) a week...I made a complete mess digging through 2.5" strips, light and dark...1.5" strips, light and dark (Trying to purpose the short ones that were extras from a log cabin quilt I cut out for long ago...)and 1.5" squares!

I matched the light and dark 2.5" strips with right sides together and cut 4 half square triangle pairs from each strip set...these will go with the 1.5" strips which will be sewn into connectors and cut to size, and the 1.5" square is the center.

How fun is it to match a civil war repro kind of thing to a debbie mumm to a 1970's calico (I had a dress out of this in highschool!!)and a scrap of shirting fabric, and a random 1.5" square? The crazier the combinations the more I like them.

I pinned each block set together, but we'll see if that helps me keep pieces in order or not. I'm thinking, knowing me...NOT!I tell you what...kitting up 42 little churn dashes does NOT make a dent in anyone's scrap bins, and certainly not mine. If anything, the drawers are harder to close now that I've stirred them all up!

However, it was great to just play with color and pattern and texture and just make these little mixed and mis-matched guys ready to sew up at my bee's Memorial Day Sew-a-thon on Monday! Actually, these blocks are going to be so cute, they finish at 5". I love little blocks!! I might have to make more, but I think 42 will give me what I want for this thing I have floating around in my head.

I spent yesterday upgrading my windows vista to windows 7. I was afraid to do it, but....tada! IT SOLVED MY PROBLEM! I was able to load EQ 5 with my EQ 6 upgrade (not sure about going to 7..)and my block base and other software with NO ERRORS. Hallelujah!

Not sure what Sunday will bring for me, but I really REALLY should spend some time reorganizing my cave down here... :c/

The new issue of AmP&Q has a vintage quilt made with 5" Churn Dash blocks. (I think of them as "skinny center Churn Dash" to differentiate them from the nine-unit-grid versin.) AmP&Q's aren't as scrappy as yours, but they have lively variety.

I'm looking forward to seeing how these wee blocks come out.I have ordered your Leaders and Enders book from a store here in N.Z, so I'm really looking forward to sitting down with a coffee and enjoy the time to look through the book.

Re: Loading EQ7--according to EQ all you'll need to load EQ7 are your two numbers from EQ6, so it should work without difficulty. (However, with the upgrade, any time you need to load the EQ7 update, you'll need those numbers.--You'll be able to have EQ7 active on two computers at a time.)Hope that helps.